


Max Laryngitis

by verbaeghe



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, M/M, Tampa Bay Lightning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-10
Updated: 2018-02-10
Packaged: 2019-03-11 04:20:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13516473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verbaeghe/pseuds/verbaeghe
Summary: Yanni wakes up without a voice and no one can understand him. No one but Jake, anyway.





	Max Laryngitis

**Author's Note:**

  * For [deputyperrish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/deputyperrish/gifts).



Yanni pauses from brushing his teeth, his brush hanging in his mouth while he sort of zones out. He _is_ trying to finish getting ready for bed, but he just can’t stop thinking about Jake and how he wishes more than anything that Jake would realize when he’s flirting. That he would notice that Yanni smiles just a bit bigger at him, that he always saves Jake the last light blue Gatorade just because it’s his favorite.

He wishes that Jake would realize that he likes him.

Yanni sighs, finishes up with his nightly regimen, and goes to bed.

//

Yanni wakes up late. He pulls on the first clothes he puts his hands on and dashes out the door. He pushes the speed more than just five or six miles over, and was pretty close to running that one light, but he arrives at morning skate just before he’d incite Coop’s wrath for being late, so it’s all very worth it in the end.

“Hey, Gourdo, oversleep much?” Pointer asks, failing at holding back his obvious grin. Yanni rolls his eyes at how weak the chirp is and opens his mouth to reply…

But nothing comes out. Not even a raspy attempt at words. Just silence. He frowns and points at his throat, shaking his head.

“Sure, okay, don’t answer me, whatever,” Pointer laughs and goes back to getting ready. Yanni frowns. How dense is Pointer that he didn’t get what Yanni is trying to get across? He tugs on Pointer’s sleeve, repeats his earlier motions. Pointer just looks confused. Yanni huffs and gives up, turning to his own gear.

He glances up when someone walks into the room, quickly dropping his eyes back to his laces when it’s Jake, who strolls over to his stall next to Yanni and starts pulling down some gear.

It had annoyed Yanni when the only open spot in the room happened to be right next to the very large Jake Dotchin, because he is annoying and sort of loud and sometimes Yanni even wonders if he is just a bit stupid, but he is also kind and quick to cheer someone up and his smile is just so...the point is, Yanni was quick to get over the stall situation.

“Hey, you’re quiet today. What’s up with that?” Yanni sighs, points to his throat. “Oh, you lost your voice. Sorry, man.”

“Oh, is _that_ what you meant?” Pointer asks. He laughs. “You need to work on your mime skills.” Yanni shoots him a murder look, but he goes on about his day like nothing happened.

“Are you sick?” Jake asks. Yanni shakes his head. He feels fine otherwise. “Then what’s the issue?” Jake leans in. He smells so good; it’s sort of torture.

Yanni shrugs. He honestly doesn’t know.

“Okay, well, I hope, um,” Jake looks confused and it’s so freaking adorable. The worst. Jake is the worst. “I hope your voice...comes...back?”

He gives Jake the best grimace-smile he can manage, hoping that he looks more like ‘thank you’ and less like ‘go screw yourself’ and they go back to getting ready for morning skate.

//

Morning skate sucks. He can’t make himself understood to his line mates and also gets yelled at by coaches no less than five times before Jake happens by and fills them in on what Yanni has been trying to get across, and since when is _that_ a thing?

He shoos Jake away when the coaches starting getting annoyed that he isn’t concentrating on his own drills. Jake doesn’t look happy, but he goes.

Yanni spends the rest of skate making sure he doesn’t mess up or have any questions because he doesn’t want Jake coming back over and getting into more trouble and having to do suicides, or something.

//

Yanni tosses his helmet into his stall so hard that it actually bounces. Spending an entire game getting chirped without any way to reciprocate is not his idea of a fun time. Not even scoring the game winner is making him feel better, because he couldn’t even celebrate properly.

He pulls off his jersey, dropping it on the bench before he rips at the Velcro holding his chest pads in place. He’s just about to throw them too when a hand lands on his bicep.

“Hey now, is this any mood for the number one star to be in?” Jake’s smile is soft and it somehow puts Yanni at ease. But then he opens his mouth and remembers that he can’t talk, and he’s angry all over again. “No, no, hey.” Jake pulls him in, places his hands on Yanni’s shoulders. “Look at me.”

Yanni is a stubborn asshole, so he looks away on purpose, but Jake gives him a little shake and he relents, shifting his attention back. “We’ll figure out what this is, okay?” Yanni shrugs with one shoulder, rolls his eyes. “We _will_.”

He has that determined look on his face that always crops up after he’s been reading some of what the media says about him, and Yanni can’t actually argue with him anyway, so he just looks at Jake and his stupid green eyes.

Yanni is jolted when the locker room doors open and the media files in. He goes tense. They’re going to want to talk to him, and he can’t, and he doesn’t know what to--

“Hey, just sneak out the side, hide in the bathroom or the showers or something, okay?” Jake pushes him that direction, then turns and puffs himself up to his full size. He throws on a bright grin. “So, who wants to talk to me first?”

Yanni somehow ducks out unnoticed.

//

Hours later, Yanni is sitting at home, feeling frustrated that he hasn’t found anything about fixing whatever is going on with him, just finding the ‘it’s probably a curse’ thing that he worked out by himself, thanks.

Like, he honestly doesn’t have any idea who would even want to curse him, but that’s pretty low on his list of things he needs to solve.

He looks up when there’s a knock at his door. He sighs, heading over even though he probably won’t be answering. Yanni puts his eye up to the peephole and isn’t sure what to think when he sees that it’s Jake.

“Hey, what’s up?” Jake asks when he opens the door. Yanni shrugs, turning away to head back to his research pile. He’s stopped by Jake’s hand. “Have you found anything?” Yanni shakes his head, trying to jiggle his arm free at the same time. Jake’s grip tightens, he looks back up.

“I think I did,” he says. Yanni doubts it, but he just manages not to roll his eyes and instead makes a ‘hurry up’ gesture with his free hand.

Jake leans in and kisses him.

Yanni blinks at him owlishly when he pulls away. He opens his mouth, “I-”

He stops, ponders what he should say, now that his voice is apparently back. Decides sassy is the way to go, “And what if that hadn’t worked?”

“Always works in the movies.” Jake grins. “And even if it didn’t, at least I got to kiss you, finally.”

Yanni pulls in him for another kiss. When it breaks, he asks, “Does that line work for you often?”

“It worked right now, and that’s all that matters.” Jake is smug. Yanni wants to kiss the look right off of his face.

So he does.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Hinted at with the title but not explained in the fic is this - It isn't a curse. Yanni's magic got sick of waiting for him to make a move and made it so only Jake could understand him. Brayden - and everyone else - did not suddenly become idiots. lol

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [La Voce To Me](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16091156) by [darkone](https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkone/pseuds/darkone)
  * [from the words that i spoke in my heart](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16146359) by [fleetingly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fleetingly/pseuds/fleetingly)




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